What we mean by 'literacy' changes over time
I'm going to dive straight in.
Let's just take this paragraph from about half-way through a hand-wringing, moralistic article about reading by Rose Horowitch in The Atlantic:
Reading books is a workout for the attention span. The more you read, the easier it is to read, and the more you’re rewarded with new understanding. Eventually the process is more pleasurable than it is challenging. But as with physical exercise, the converse is true as well: The less you read, the more difficult it is to read, and the rockier the path to acquiring knowledge.
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